Jane's attic, update XVII: Building those walls!

They say the best things in life are for free, but that certainly doesn't hold true for Jane's attic. Because 'for free' implies that you get it for nothing, effortlessly, while, by contrast, designing and building the attic has been a lengthy, challenging process that required lots of planning, dedication, discipline, patience, and above all, perseverance!

Carving the individual bricks, one at the time.

The images in this project update show the outside surfaces of the attic walls, consisting of bricks carved on cardboard, covered with plaster, and finally weathered for a more realistic effect.

As with the rest of the attic, when it came to making the walls look realistic, 'cutting corners' was never an option. For instance, although most of the bricks would be covered with plaster, leaving only a few of them really exposed for view, I decided to carve all four external walls from top to bottom, not just the places where the bricks would be seen. This meant that I had to carve more than one thousand individual 'bricks' in all.

The 'ghostly' silhouettes of the bricks showing underneath the plaster.

The reason for this is that the thickness of the layer (or layers) of plaster would not be equal across the entire surface of the walls, allowing the bricks underneath the plaster to be distinguishable at those places where the plaster is thinner, as shown in the above image. This is something that some real, plastered walls also show. Again, no concessions were done even if this meant a lot of extra work. The result, however, was worth the effort!

The weathering of the walls was done in an equally meticulous way. The 'moss and dirt' shown on the image above are a testament to that!

 

The dilapidated window with the shutters blends perfectly with its companion, the 'ancient' back wall of the attic. Together they've endured Nature's tantrums, tempests, rain, scorching heat and many an autumn storm, leaving them both heavily battered, yet unbeaten.

The irregular layers of plaster on the walls creates a three-dimensional, uneven surface, which breaks the light that shines on them in very interesting and unexpected ways, resulting in an ever changing symphony of shadows and lights which is a joy to look at, let alone photograph!

In all, I'm very happy with how the external surfaces of the walls ended up looking. They are the 'skin' of the old attic, its scarred carapace, so to speak. They were a pain in the eye to do, but all that is forgotten now, and the only thing remaining is a big, BIG smile on my face!

Thanks for visiting, and see you next time!

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